


Hoggle and the Magic Peach

by Milligan (Blackheathen)



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-18
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:55:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24783460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blackheathen/pseuds/Milligan
Summary: A bedtime story for good little goblins!
Kudos: 6





	Hoggle and the Magic Peach

Hoggle and The Magic Peach

When King Jareth of the Labyrinth woke up that morning, he had a suspicion. Something was out of place and that could only mean one thing. It was going to be a bad day. The thing that was out of place clucked happily anyway, because chickens aren't very clever, being only a teeny bit smarter than goblins. This particular chicken was happy because it had discovered the softest, fluffiest and most extravagant perching spot in all the Labyrinth.

And that, of course, was King Jareths head.

Jareth had never bothered to learn chicken talk, but that didn't stop him from squawking. He flapped his arms and made the feathers from his pillow fly about the room. The chicken however was not about to give up  its prized perch so easily. It was nearly time for the mornings production after all!

Still flapping and clucking, Jareth climbed out of his bed and went over to the window. He leaned over the stone edge and bellowed for his current goblin captain.

"MAGGOT!" he shouted. There was no answer. "MAGGOT! Why are you not on duty when your King needs you?"

Now Captain Maggot  _ was _ on duty in what had been widely believed (amongst the goblins) to be the most likely spot in which King Jareth would want to look for him. Outside the Kings' bedroom door. Hearing the commotion that was Jareth shouting from the windowsill, he had to run full tilt down every single flight of stairs (and you know how many stairs are in the Castle, don't you?) until he reached the courtyard underneath Jareths' window.

"Y, y, yes, your Majesty" he puffed when he reached the bottom. "I'm here Your Highness"

"Well it's about time!" shouted Jareth. "Look at this, just look at this!" he continued, pointing to his silver hair. Maggot just nodded.

"Ah, yes Your Majesty" he babbled. The Kings hair looked just like it did any other day to him, but then Maggot did not have particularly good eyesight. Suddenly Jareth made a sound that Maggot thought was very like his old neighbours hen did when....

An egg sailed down from the heights above. With the typical accuracy of falling eggs in the Labyrinth, it landed squarely on his large nose. As he wiped yolk out of his nose, King Jareth continued to shout down at him.

"Well? What are you doing  _ down there  _ Maggot? I need you up here at once! We need to do another Chicken Roundup, and you can start with my room!"

"Yes, Your Majesty. At once" Maggot said, his legs already grumbling at having to go back up the stairs. But before he turned to start the return journey, he had a moment of Rash Boldness.

"Oh, Your Highness!" he called. Jareth, who was still fluffing feathers out of his hair, looked back down at his goblin captain.

"Yes?"

"Happy Birthday Ja...I mean, Your Highness!"

His birthday! That's right, it certainly was. After one thousand three hundred and twenty eight of them, you would think that Jareth would remember the date. Or perhaps it was  _ because _ he had had so many. But then Jareth was known forgetting a great many things, especially some peoples' names.

Jareth inspected himself in the mirror that hung on the wall. The chicken, having done its morning duty was now more than ever disinclined to leave its resting place. It gripped  its grubby feet around clumps of his precious hair. Jareth really wanted to send a magic feather-singeing spell at the chicken, but he dared not because he adored his hair and didn't want to risk ruining it. He experimented by moving a few strands here and there. Hmm, well, he might be able to get away with it, he thought. And the party was 'fancy dress' after all.

The party! Jareth did a little jig of happiness in his pyjamas. He did so love parties, and cake and dancing and presents and.....

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, in another part of the Labyrinth Kingdom, Hoggle the dwarf also knew it was going to be bad day. He stooped to peer into his letterbox. Mail! He had real mail. His large hands fumbled with the pile of envelopes. Bills, as usual. His account with the Fairy Spray Company was overdue, apparently. There was a letter from his great aunts' second cousins' friend, no doubt wanting the recipe for Eau-de-Bog that everyone knew Hoggle had been secretly working on. There was a letter from the Goldfish Preservation Society, wanting to know if he intended to repair the pond that he had 'polluted'. The Warning Walls had also written, politely reminding him that he was six months overdue for his (well paid, they thought) task of taking a tape measure and working out how far one of their number had gotten on his mission to visit the King.

Hoggle sighed and flipped through the mail again, just to be sure. No, it wasn't there. No matter how hard he looked, there was  definitely No Invitation. Hoggle scowled and stomped back to his cottage. Once inside, he sat down at his kitchen table to have a sulk.

"How typical!" he muttered and grumbled. "And me, a real Hero an' all too!"

It was true. Ever since his single handed defeat of the huge metal Guardian at the gates of the City, Hoggles' fame amongst the goblins had grown. His legend as a Brave Person of Small Stature had brought Hoggle a lot of attention from the goblin community. Goblins came from far and wide to stand at his door and look through his windows. Sometimes they would whisper together afterwards.

"Well, he looks a lot smaller in real life".

Hoggle made himself a cup of tea and sulked a bit more. Not even his rountine inspection of his jools made him feel any better. It wasn't fair, he moped to himself. "Nuthin fun ever happens to me. Not even an invite to the party neither" he sniffed. "Jareth don't even know I exist any more"

It was an unfortunate part of Hoggles' personality that meant he had convieniently forgotten that his role in The Great Sarah The Solver incident was somewhat less than that of a willing and faithful servant. Hoggle was so used to switching sides that it wasn't hard to get a little confused in all the things he'd said and done that day.

"Give her the peach, that's what he said" he said to himself. "And that's just what I did too! Just like he wanted! An off she goes all prettily dressed up to the party......hmm off to the party.....one of them magic peaches"

Hoggle got down from the table and scuttled off into his room. He had a lot to do before nightfall and all of a sudden the day seemed like it might turn out not so bad at all. Hoggle had an idea.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maggots' day of Chicken Wrangling was going from bad to worse. Despite what Jareth the King thought, chickens seemed to be in short supply. And no sooner had he rounded up a fair number of the silly creatures than a long line of Noble folk started to form outside his office. Each one selected a chicken, then hurried off back to the castle. Maggot couldn't understand it. No one had mentioned to him that it was a 'bring your own chicken dinner' party. Several goblins had then set up a petition for the release of the chickens, since they were the main source of fun in the Kingdom.

The two Ladies glared down at him. They had arrived late in the afternoon and now the availible chickenry were less than impressive. The Ladies sniffed and tutted loudly.

"This will never do" said one.

"Absolutely impossible" said the other.

"We will be the laughing stock of the entire party".

Maggot was trying to be a helpful goblin when he said, "Surely Ladies, there will be plenty to eat at the Party".

The Ladies glared at him.

"Stupid goblin! We're not going to eat them. Haven't you heard? Chickens are  _ the _ latest thing in hair accessories"

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It had always been tricky for Hoggle to sneak anywhere, mainly because his old bones tended to grumble of their own accord wherever he went. And it was doubly hard nowadays with his ever present goblin tag alongs. It was generally believed that something of importance would happen wherever Hoggle went. A well placed goblin could make it onto the staff of  _ Goblin Weekly  _ with the right story, and everyone knew that the  _ Goblin Weekly  _ got invited to all the Big Doings in the Labyrinth.

King  Jareths ' orchards were usually well guarded, but nearly everyone had been caught up in the Party preparations. At least two dozen goblins had been called up simply to mix the cake batter, and when it was baked it was six feet wide in order to hold all the candles. A further twenty eight had been drafted into the  all important candle-counting duty. No one had forgotten what had happened after the last party when the King had discovered his cake to be one candle too many.

Hoggle squirmed in through a small hole in the fence, one which was immediately made a whole lot larger as at least twenty goblins followed him two at a time. Hoggle went to the only tree that stood in the orchard, which was Jareths' Magical Peach Tree. On the lowest branches hung several fruit, sweet and golden.

The goblins oooohed and aaaahed at Hoggles' daring. No one had ever picked one of the peaches like Hoggle was doing. No one had ever taken a bite of one like that. He was a true Hero.

"What  yer doin, Hoggle?" said one goblin, quill and paper in hand.

"Never you mind. I'm just takin' my rightful dues is all" Hoggle said. The goblins thought he sounded a bit funny. He started to sway a bit, back and forth. The goblin with the quill and paper scribbled it all down.

"Hey look" said another goblin, pointing up to the sky. Down came a little thing that looked just like a bubble. Goblins had seen these before. "Oooh" they said as the bubble got bigger and bigger till finally it landed right on Hoggle and scooped him up into the air!

Off into the night he floated, and the goblins watched until he was a tiny dot in the sky. One of the goblins picked up the peach from the ground and looked at it. Well, since there were no chickens to be found anywhere in the Labyrinth......

"Looks like fun" he said.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jareth was having a great time at his birthday Party. All the best people were there. And since his chief dresser and hair fluffer had let it be rumoured about the castle of the 'latest in hair fashion' that you just 'had to have', he didn't feel at all out of place with a chicken on his head.

He sat on his best throne and greeted the guests one by one as they arrived by bubble. Anyone who was anyone in society had been invited. He hadn't recieved a single inability. Jareths' parties were known as the best in not only the Labyrinth (which was a dubious honour since only he was allowed to have them), but in all the Underground. Nobody even minded the fact that it was a Kingdom of goblins, as long as no had to actually  _ touch _ one.

Jareth watched his guests dancing and having fun. How nice it was to have some time with people who were not goblins, he thought to himself. It was widely believed that Jareth had inherited the Labyrinth from his powerful parents, but the truth was he had played 'rock paper scissors' with his siblings in order to find which one of them would end up with the dreary place. And he'd never been good at that game.

But none of that mattered tonight. Tonight he could sing and dance and play 'pin the fairy on the donkey' without tripping over sozzled goblins. There was a popping sound as yet another bubble arrived in the ballroom. Jareth looked to see who it was who was so fashionably late, and to see how big a box his present was in. The newcomer was far shorter than everyone else in the room. His mask was a plain weaving of grass with dried fairies stuck in it. The guest looked around himself in wonder and Jareth imagined with a secret laugh that he was only just realising that he had no chickenable fashion whatsoever. Also, there was no apparent present! Jareth tapped his chin lightly. There was something odd about this guest, he was familiar somehow....

Jareth was about to go and shake down the guest for his gift when he was distracted by the arrival of his cake. It was carried into the room by three huge Stone Callers and set down on the vastly overloaded table. With a flourish, Jareth swept his hand across the cake, lighting all of the one thousand three hundred and twenty nine candles.

It was under the rousing chorus of 'Happy Birthday To You' that the first of the goblin gatecrashers arrived.

At first, no one noticed a thing, although this was not surprising at one of King Jareths' parties. He was well known for dumping would be revellers in the Bog in he felt he was being paid less than one hundred percent of the attention.

One of the Ladies, the very same one who had had the disgrace of only being able to procure chicken leftovers, felt something rustling underneath her skirts! She watched the Goblin King carefully. He seemed to be engrossed in blowing out his candles, and in fact he was turning a rather odd shade of purple, so she quickly bent down to see what it was that made a strange looking lump in her dress. Unfortunately as she bent down, her head came rather too close to those candles that were still alight. Her chicken head-dress was not impressed.

Both the Lady and the chicken let out a shriek. The chicken did because it was now on fire, and the Lady did because she had discovered under her skirts a......

"Goblin!" she shrieked.

The goblin grinned at her. "Chicken!" it shouted.

The chicken leapt from the Lady's head and the goblin went after it. Both landed smack in the middle of Jareths' birthday cake. Jareth looked up from his candle blowing to find an icing covered singed chicken and a goblin staring at him. Then, the party really started.

Goblins chased chickens. Chickens tried to hide in overdone hairdo's. Ladies screamed. Gentlemen fainted.

Goblins swung from the chandeliers.

Goblins played hide and seek in the cake.

Goblins used Ladies skirts as sacks with which to carry their chicken booty.

Goblins got into the cabinet of his magical Clock and swung from the pendulum, making everything and everyone speed up threefold.

Jareth just couldn't believe it. Everything had gone wrong! His party was in ruins. His guests had run away in disgust. He sat on his throne with his head in his hands. Goodness, but he had only just stopped hearing the gossip about his last party, the one where That Girl had broken his ballroom and dumped everyone into the junkyard! He would never live this down, not ever.

Silence descended on the tattered remains of the party room. All the beautiful ribbons and decorations were ruined. Cake covered goblins belched and compared their chicken catches with each other. Jareth started to think. How, he wondered, did these infernal goblins get into my ballroom?

He went down and grabbed up one such goblin, holding it up to his eye level.

"Who" he said, in a somewhat forced polite tone, "who was it that let you in?". The goblin swung from his grip for a while before answering.

"It was Hoggle"

"Hoggle" repeated Jareth. Hoggle, Hoggle. Where had he heard that name before?

"Yes sir, Hoggle it was who stole them peaches". Other goblins heard and started saying Hoggle, Hoggle, Hoggle, Hoggle. They were all saying the name, except for one. Jareth saw that it was the same short guest who had arrived late, without a present. He strode over to the figure where it stood trying to hide beneath a pot plant.

"You're Hoggle, aren't you!" Jareth said, bending down. The figure shook it's large head till it wobbled. "Oh come on, I know your name is Hoggle!"

"Oh no sir, no I'm not!" protested the figure.

"Well then, who are you?" shouted Jareth.

"I'm Higgle"

The End


End file.
